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Did the children of Adam and Eve commit incest?

This is something I never understood. If there were only Adam and Eve at the beginning like the Bible says, how did mankind populate themselves? If we are to believe the bible, that can't happen without having Adam and Eve's children committing incest. But I find this quite weird, since Judeo-Christian religion prohibits incest severely. Is there any clear answer to this?

Re: Did the children of Adam and Eve commit incest?

The Old Testament narrates that Abraham banged his own half-sister and Lot made sweet love with his daughters (even though it also says he was sleeping but come on ...). I fail to see where incest is forbidden in the Bible.

"When one person suffers from a delusion it is called insanity. When many people suffer from a delusion it is called religion." -- Robert Pirsig

"Feminists are silent when the bills arrive." -- Aetius

"Women have made a pact with the devil — in return for the promise of exquisite beauty, their window to this world of lavish male attention is woefully brief." -- Some Guy

Re: Did the children of Adam and Eve commit incest?

The Old Testament narrates that Abraham banged his own half-sister and Lot made sweet love with his daughters (even though it also says he was sleeping but come on ...). I fail to see where incest is forbidden in the Bible.

Werent they supposed to be some of the only humans "worth" saving as well

Re: Did the children of Adam and Eve commit incest?

Again there was nothing about incest until man made it up. It was for genetic reasons even though they didnt know it. Too many queens with 6 teats proved the point. Incest nowdays however isnt the same threat it used to be. Gene pools used to be very small as there was not means of transportation and people married those near by them. The gene pools are so diverse at this point that it would take generations for incest to have any real effect.

I have nothing against the womens movement. Especially when Im walking behind it.

Re: Did the children of Adam and Eve commit incest?

It is rather disheartening to have to explain the same thing over and over again.

literal meaning: it is not asserted nor denied that the people Cain finds later were his descendants, thus allowing for other possibilities.

metaphoric meaning: Adam is the prototype of man, as such not the first man, but humanity as a category. Thus his descendants are not literally brothers.

esoteric meaning - transcultural: in Avestan Persian myth (Gayomart), in Chinese myth (P'an Ku), in Indian myth (Purusa) and in many others, including Jewish Kabbalah (Adam Kadmon) the first man is a giant who is comprisive of the rest of mankind and has sometimes an intermediary function in creation. It is usually torn into pieces as a consequence of a sin or failure, and thus causes the birth of mankind.

cultural meaning - theorized by anthropological and archeological research: Cain and Abel are peoples or tribes, embodying archetypal farmers-urban dwellwers-smiths (Cain) who are evil and wicked and nomadic shepherds (Abel) who are good and worthy.

[edit] Scholarship
The Biblical Book of Judges 19-21 seems to offer a story very similar to Lot's ordeal in Sodom and Gomorrah. This has led many critical scholars to surmise that both tales stem from a similar legend and not from a historical account. Such issues have also called into question whether Lot was an actual person or simply a fictional character in a cautionary fable (101 Myths of the Bible, Greenberg, 2000).

Re: Did the children of Adam and Eve commit incest?

It is quite clear in a litteralistic reading of Genesis that other humans were created seperately from Adam and Eve. The inhabitants of the Land of Nod were their contemporaries, and Cain was exiled there. Genesis does not describe how these people came into being however. So no incest is necassry at this point in the story.
The most incestuous things were ever forced to get were when first cousins had to marry after the flood (i.e. Noah's grandchildren). Obviously there are cases of incest elsewhere in the Bible.
The Jewish Encyclopia notes the following prohibitions on incest:
The following, however, are the degrees of consanguinity and relationship within which marriage is forbidden as incestuous in Deuteronomy: the father's wife (xxi. 30, xxvii. 20); a sister or half-sister (xxvii. 22); and a mother-in-law (xxvii. 23). In all three points, however, even in Ezekiel's time, custom by no means upheld the law (Ezek. xxii. 10 et seq.).

The so-called Priestly Code goes furthest in forbidding marriages among relatives. According to Lev. xviii. 6-18, a man may under no circumstances marry: (1) mother, (2) stepmother, (3) sister, (4) son's daughter, (5) daughter's daughter, (6) half-sister, father's side [or mother's side], (7) father's sister, (8) mother's sister [aunt], (9) wife of father's brother, (10) daughter-in-law, (11) sister-in-law, (12) wife and her daughter [or wife and (16) her mother], (13) wife's son's daughter, (14) wife's daughter's daughter, or (15) wife and her sister [both living]. In Lev. xx. 11-21 another list is given, which enumerates only Nos. 2, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, and 12, and omits those that are implied, such as mother's sister, granddaughter, and sister-in-law; explaining also that No. 6 includes a half-sister on the mother's side, and that No. 12 includes wife and her mother. This chapter describes the punishments of the various classes of incest.http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/vi...er=I&artid=126

However, it also notes that many central figures broke these prohibitions and did not seem to suffer any censure as a result. This is obviously perfectly consistent with the idea that Lev. and Duet. were composed far later than the we would suppose from prima facae internal evidence, and were created by a class of people who did not have full control over the Jewish people of the time.

Re: Did the children of Adam and Eve commit incest?

Originally Posted by Rush Limbaugh

Again there was nothing about incest until man made it up.

Lots of mamals have mechanisms which prevent incest, such as driving young males out of a herd when they reach maturity (elephants, horses, certain primates etc.). Obviously having a concept of incest needs language, so in that sense man made it up.

It was for genetic reasons even though they didnt know it. Too many queens with 6 teats proved the point.

Interestingly, in ancient societies it was only the royals and sometimes high nobility who were not effected by prohibitions on incest. Also, the whole thing about incest creating damaged offspring is slightly overplayed. Its not incest so much having a small mating group, as long as you don't only have incest, you'll be broadly speaking ok.

Incest nowdays however isnt the same threat it used to be. Gene pools used to be very small as there was not means of transportation and people married those near by them. The gene pools are so diverse at this point that it would take generations for incest to have any real effect.

Again, this is kind of an odd idea. Sure if you only have incest then it will increase the rate of consolidation of genetic problems. However, if you have some incest and some outbreading, its the size of the group that matters.

I would suggest that concerns regarding the fitness of offspring have little to do with prohibitions on incest. Studies of groups of children who have grown up in close contact show that there is markedly less sexual atraction between people who knew each other from children. Interestingly, this is one of the reasons the Kibutz system in Israel, especially where there is communal childcare, is problematic. This is probably a large factor. Others might include problems to do with maintaining controll over one's household and one's community if one doesn't have fairly strict rules about with marriages are appropriate and which aren't. Sex between people inside families is also problematic because it raises concerns about the Patriach's authority, and the provenance of his wife's or wives' children, about maintaining the virginity of daughters and so on. All in all, there are lots of good sociological reasons to forbid incest, and the problems of hereditary genetic defects pale in comparison.

Re: Did the children of Adam and Eve commit incest?

Juggernaut,

We have to accept that this indeed happened and happened again immediately after the flood. We also have to accept that this is as prevalent today, perhaps even moreso, than then and it doesn't mean that all would develop problems as today shows.

If evolution was and is what more than most would have us believe then incest would have been just as prevalent, but, in the creationist's case God, when the time was right gave us commands to adjust these matters. So if the attempt is to make out that they were all screwballs, then by evolution that must be many times worse.